The BPI has asked BT to bar access to the Pirate Bay Website even though its attempt to block Newzbin has failed

After “successfully” forcing BT to block Newzbin2, the telecoms giant has now been asked to block the Pirate Bay site following a High Court ruling to enforce UK copyright law. Despite initial attempts, it appears that BT has not actually succeeded in binning Newzbin2.

A coalition of record companies, publishers, and Hollywood film studios won a recent case which has led to the BPI writing to BT requesting action against Pirate Bay. If the company does not act voluntarily to block the site, it could receive a court order, as it did with the Newzbin2 ban.

BT ban fails to bite

It appears that BT’s attempt to block Newzbin2 on 2 November has already failed. A check by eWEEK Europe over a standard BT DNS-based broadband link displayed the site with no problems. Newzbin has sworn to circumvent the ban and so far appears to be winning. The organisation has released an access client which it claims will bypass any further measures BT takes. If BT fails, the BPI may have to revert to individual court cases against file sharers.

The Pirate Bay said that it is not concerned about bans because there are so many ways to defeat such measures. When the Belgian ban was announced, the Website simply advised users to choose an independent Domain Name Server (DNS) such as the Google DNS service – one of many such independent DNS servers.

At that time a Pirate Bay blogger wrote: “Today we learned that we’re being blocked – again! Yawn. When will they give up – we’re still growing despite (or perhaps because) of all their efforts.

“So, if you live in Belgium (or maybe work at the European Union Parliament, we have thousands of visits from them every day) you should change your DNS in order to circumvent the blockage. You should do this anyhow – never trust your ISP,” the blogger advised.

BT does not appear to be willing to act on the BPI request. In a statement the company said, “We can confirm we are now in receipt of a letter from the BPI. BT is considering its response. In line with the Newzbin judgment, a court order will be needed before any blocking could begin.”

A ban on Pirate Bay would be in line with several other countries, such as Ireland, Italy, Belgium, Sweden and Denmark, which have already banned the site. Any action on the part of BT would effectively put the site out of reach of its six million customers. BT is concerned that this may lead to an exodus to other ISPs that will still have access to the Pirate Bay and other black market services.